Drug advertising in the German free-of-charge health magazine Apotheken Umschau (Pharmacy review): a critical analysis.

In Germany, the Apotheken Umschau (Pharmacy review) is a very popular health magazine for lay people, which is available free of charge in pharmacies. In this study, drug advertising in the Apotheken Umschau was critically analyzed. To our knowledge, studies on drug advertisements in such magazines are scarce. For the analyses, a total of 123 different advertisements from all 48 issues of Apotheken Umschau in 2020 and 2021 were compared. Since 2021 is the first year that was completely characterized by the COVID-19 pandemic, it was thus also possible to work out pandemic effects. More preparations from the categories immune system, eyes and sleep were advertised in 2021. Accordingly, typical complaints home office workers were addressed. Advertisements provided only very modest scientific information, if at all. The Therapeutic Products Advertising Act (Medicines Advertising Law; Heilmittelwerbegesetz (HWG)) provides regulations regarding the handling of drug advertising. However, in various categories, we noted substantial deficiencies of the advertisements to comply to regulations, e.g. the disclosure of adverse effects and omission of the mandatory statement "For risks and adverse effects, read the package insert and ask your doctor or pharmacist (Für Risiken und Nebenwirkungen fragen Sie Ihren Arzt oder Apotheker oder lesen Sie die Packungsbeilage)". Fifty-one of the 123 advertisements featured females to appeal particularly to this target group. Furthermore, a homogeneous ethnic (Caucasian) picture and a traditional image of German society were presented although this clearly deviates from reality. In conclusion, this study provides insights into the yet poorly studied mechanisms of drug advertisement for lay people. Pharmacological evidence plays a much smaller role than psychology, marketing and traditional societal models. It appears that drug companies intentionally use the "grey area" of the Medicines Advertising Law to optimally promote their products and ignore mandatory statements. This practice must be stopped by stricter legal control to protect the consumer from misinformation. In this way, drug safety will be increased.